The
third and last in the series of “presidential debates” went unwatched and
unmissed by this column, there being no question – as we’ve insisted now for
what seems like two or three decades – that the “contest” on November 2 will
be decided, not by the people, but by the press.

We are so sure of this,
indeed, that our head didn’t leave the pillow last week until it learned
that “homosexuality” had been talked about in the final episode of this
beauty pageant.

Specifically, after George
W. Bush remarked with typical clarity, “Whoo! Let me start with the Pell
grants,” the “moderator” of the debate that evening, Bob Schieffer of CBS
News, responded sharply, “Mr. President, let's get back to economic issues.
But let's shift to some other questions here.”

If you can figure out what
that means, bully for you. Schieffer’s brother, Tom, is not only Ding-Dong’s
current ambassador to Australia, one of our stauncher allies in the
Coalition of the Willies – excuse me, the Willing -- but was formerly also
his business partner when he (Dumbo) “ran the Texas Rangers,” according to
Time magazine.

None of this was formally
disclosed, of course, before, during or after the debate. Addressing both
candidates, brow a-furrow and heart aflame, Schieffer pressed bravely on:
“Both of you are opposed to gay marriage. But to understand how you have
come to that conclusion, I want to ask you a more basic question. Do you
believe homosexuality is a choice?”

Dimwit answered first. “You
know, Bob,” he said, “I don't know. I just don't know.” And, indeed, he
doesn’t. Neither does he care: “I do know that we have a choice to make in
America, and that is to treat people with tolerance and respect and dignity.
It's important that we do that. I also know, in a free society, people,
consenting adults, can live the way they want to live. And that's to be
honored.”

Bush then went on to
dishonor the way lots and lots of people in this free society want to live,
spouting a lot of blather about “the sanctity of marriage” and how
“important” it is “that we protect marriage as an institution between a man
and a woman.” Words that are easy to say, and which no one can really
contradict, provided you realize that “a man and a woman” means one man and
one woman at a time. You can have as many as you want if you do it in order
– i.e., “my first wife,” “my second wife,” “Cyndi” and little Ego, Jr., then
long years of drooling idiocy and Viagra-popping to keep the old man’s plug
in gear. There’s nothing sacred about it, I’m afraid, so long as any
“heterosexual” idiot can marry on a whim and divorce at the same level of
thought.

Well, all right – this is
old news. The kicker didn’t come from anything Ding-Dong had to say, but
from Kerry’s perfectly straightforward comment that Dick and Lynne Cheney’s
daughter Mary is, you know, a lesbian.

"We're all God's children,
Bob,” is what this Massachusetts liberal actually said. “And I think if you
were to talk to Dick Cheney's daughter, who is a lesbian, she would tell you
she's being who she was; she's being who she was born as. I think if you
talked to anybody, it's not (a) choice."

Well! Judging from the
response of the Bush campaign and a raging horde of right-wing bigots,
bloggers and blowhards, you’d have thought Kerry had accused Mary Cheney of
stealing Christian babies and drinking their blood, as well as having little
horns growing out of her head. Certainly, the response of the Cheney family
and their minions would suggest that they think the label of “lesbian”
amounts to really, really bad news. Listen to Mama Cheney, post-debate.

“I [had] a chance to assess
John Kerry once more,” she said. “And the only thing I could conclude is
that this is not a good man. And I’m speaking as a mom and a pretty
indignant mom. This is not a good man. What a cheap and tawdry political
trick.”

Of course, Mrs. Cheney
might well have asked if Bob Schieffer’s original question to the candidates
was itself “cheap and tawdry,” there being no way for anyone with a brain to
answer it; the question was posed in the first place only to highlight such
minuscule differences as exist between Bush and Kerry on a issue that
doesn’t touch them personally or, I expect, concern them at all

Mrs. Cheney may even have
considered it “cheap and tawdry” that Kerry, by mentioning Mary, deftly
evaded the whole gay-marriage flap. But she wouldn’t want to repeat the
phrase too often, lest “cheap and tawdry” bring to mind the essence of her
own 1981 “lesbian romance novel,” Sisters, a steamy potboiler, reportedly
slated for republication this year, that “celebrates” Sapphic love,
according to The New York Daily News, promotes the use of condoms and other
“preventative devices” and features a woman character “who has unmarried sex
with the widow of her sister.”

Wait a minute – hold
everything. How can a woman have sex with her sister’s widow unless the
sister and the widow were married to start with? Hmm …

Well, let’s not look too
closely at that. Sisters isn’t the kind of book an indignant mom would want
to see passed around at the next Republican pot luck. It was, however,
recently adapted for a satirical staging at the New York Theatre Workshop as
part of a celebration of Laura Flanders' scathing expose, Bushwomen: Tale of
a Cynical Species. Lines like these nearly brought down the house:

“Let us go away together,
away from the anger and the imperatives of men. We shall find ourselves a
secluded bower where they dare not venture. There will be only the two of
us, and we shall linger through long afternoons of sweet retirement."

And even better, here’s one
of the dykes in Sisters reflecting on a letter from her lover: "How well her
words describe our love -- or the way it would be if we could remove all
impediments, leave this place, and join together. ... Then our union would
be complete. Our lives would flow together, twin streams merging into a
single river."

I won’t contribute further
to the moral degradation of this great land by singling out other, similarly
depraved quotations from Mrs. Cheney’s chef d’ouevre. If homosexuality
really is “a choice,” Mrs. Cheney’s high-romantic tastes – not to mention
her writing style -- might easily have improved over the years, just as the
whole Cheney clan, I’m sure, is looking forward to the day that Mary comes
to her senses and marries an oilman somewhere. Or, if being gay isn’t a
choice, becomes a nun.

Suffice to say, in Kerry’s
defense, Mary Cheney is a “known lesbian,” that is, an “openly gay” person,
who has previously worked for the Republican Party in an effort to drag
faggots into the fold; who did the same thing for a while for the Coors’
beer factory in Colorado; and who didn’t seem to mind at all, last August,
when Dick Cheney told a crowd of Republican proto-fascists in Iowa, “Lynne
and I have a gay daughter.” Mary was even mentioned by name and … um …
preference at the Vice-presidential debate, when Democrat John Edwards
complimented Cheney pčre for his "wonderful" willingness to talk about his
daughter's sexual orientation without dropping dead in his tracks.

But this big, swollen,
throbbing non-issue won’t be going away anytime soon. Last week, the
worldwide Anglican Church, under the direction of the Archbishop of
Canterbury, issued a 93-page report that chastised its American branch, the
Episcopal Church (USA), for having “caused deep offense” last year when it
approved the ordination of “openly gay” Canon Gene Robinson as Bishop of New
Hampshire.

“By electing and confirming
such a candidate,” says the Anglican decree, “in the face of the concerns
expressed by the wider communion, the Episcopal Church (USA)” should be sent
to bed without its supper – or something. It’s hard to tell what this
lunatic document really means. Certainly, it recommends that the US Church
“express it regret” for such a colossal misdeed; that anyone who took part
in the consecration of Robinson should think about withdrawing “from
representative functions in the Anglican Communion”; that a moratorium
should be placed at once on Church blessings of same-sex unions; and that
Episcopal clergy, if they happen to find themselves “living in a same-gender
union” should knock it off, pronto.

As might be predicted, none
of this will happen. Conservatives in both the American and worldwide
Communion were “disappointed” by a report that failed to come down harder on
the offending parties and are currently taking their dolls and going home.
Those who “took part” in Robinson’s ordination are standing as firm as ever
on his fitness for the job. The Archbishop of Canterbury is wringing his
hands, saying there are no “simple answers” to be had. And the only two
people who kept their mouths shut last week were Robinson and – you guessed
it – Mary Cheney, both whom seem to think that the world will go on
spinning, one way or another. Amen, as they say, to them.